prayers for the stolen by jennifer clement

From an absent father, to the violence that engulfs the town, there are many things that occur off frame. The movie is filled with elements that one can only hear, or barely sense, like a tip of an iceberg. Prayers for the Stolen Credit: The Match Factory We looked and looked through many villages for then to work with Fátima Toledo who is an incredible acting couch, a sort of shaman, who became a teacher for me and the kids.

Finding the actresses was a far more laborious aspect because I didn’t want a child actor who came from the city and would immediately get blisters from walking through the mountain. You become even more aware of how details as the texture of the walls, the clothes, their color, affects the overall story. It was a titanic labor but this manipulation, which certainly exists in documentary and is empowered to the thousands in fiction was immensely satisfactory. We built from scratch many sceneries like the poppy field, Ana’s house we even created the rain. Here I was amazed because we had to generate everything, we shot in this extraordinarily beautiful mountain called Neblinas but there was nothing else.

In documentary things already exist, the characters, the live behind them, the situations that they transit, their personal relationships and their tragedies. How did you felt that leap from documentary to fiction? The film feels immensely organic in its formal approach which gives a very clear feeling of reality to it. To me, as a documentarist, this was the starting point as I found fascinating how organized crime is in collusion with many of the mining companies and they arrive at the places, dispossess the towns, force them to give their lands. At the same time it is one of the impressive poppy growing enclaves of Mexico, a multimillionaire business which translates into the absence of state forces and the appearance of organized crime. A deeply violent place that has been at war for several years and has a strong presence of mining grounds that have violently looted the nature there.

In this case I had a great starting point with the novel “Night of Fire” by Jennifer Clement, which occurs in the Guerrero. I could only approach this film through my own documentary process, which starts with the character but is intimately tied to the location. What was you starting point when approaching this one? In your Vision du Réel Masterclass you talked extensively about the process of investigation in your films.

Variety talked with Huezo as the film premieres at Un Certain Regard. Filled with striking images taken at magic hour and an acute sound design that builds a deep nature world where the characters live. Produced by Nicolas Celis’ Pimienta Film and Jim Stark alongside The Match Factory, which handles world sales, Desvía Films, Borde Cadre Films and Cactus Films, it’s a firm step into fiction for what is already a shining documentary career.

Prayers for the stolen by jennifer clement